Giovanni Bartolena - Untitled

The painting can be defined as a genre scene, that is, the depiction of an episode of everyday life that, apparently, lacks any significant element. These types of domestic subjects were long considered minor and only began to spread in Western art starting in the 17th century. Only with the development of 19th-century realism did everyday subjects become considered as important as historical or religious ones. The artist Giovanni Bartolena drew inspiration primarily from military genre scenes with uniformed figures and horses.

Giovanni Bartolena is a prominent representative of the Labronica School, and his pictorial language is distinguished by the prevalence of color over line and a synthetic style of application that represents a reinterpretation of the Tuscan Macchiaioli tradition. In his works, we can appreciate how his use of light, always through the tonal values ​​of color, is highly dramatic. As in Macchiaioli paintings, the light fills the entire scene, clear and crisp, while in the distance a darker, humid sky looms.

Giovanni Bartolena (Livorno, 1866 – 1942). He exhibited for the first time in 1892 at the Promotrice in Turin. In 1920 he joined the Gruppo Labronico, where well-known artists from Livorno gathered at the Caffè Bardi in Livorno, following in the footsteps of the famous Caffè Michelangiolo, a meeting place for Macchiaioli artists decades earlier. In 1925 his first solo exhibition was held in Milan, which achieved considerable success. In 1926 he participated in the Mostra del Paesaggio in Bologna, in 1927 in the exhibition of the Circolo di Cultura in Bologna, and held other solo exhibitions in Livorno, at the Bottega d'Arte, and in Milan. He participated in exhibitions at the Galleria Micheli in Milan in 1929 and 1930, in the first Quadriennale in Rome in 1931, and in the Venice Biennale in 1932.

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